[kortilla]

The article says they can bump you. “Generally, no” is not “no”.

> Generally, no. If you have met the following conditions, airlines are not allowed to deny you permission to board, or remove you from the flight if you have already boarded the flight: You have checked-in for your flight before the check-in deadline set by the airlines; and

>A gate agent has accepted your paper boarding pass or electronically scanned your boarding pass and let you know that you may proceed to board. However, airlines may deny boarding or remove you from a flight even after accepting your boarding pass and informing you that you may proceed to board if the denial or removal is due to a safety, security, or health risk, or due to a behavior that is considered obscene, disruptive, or otherwise unlawful.

They can easily use safety under “weights and balances” as the reason.

[DannyBee]

You seem very defeatist in all of your comments on this thread.

You are right that they can lie and claim lots of things to say the person needs to be removed.

It's pretty easy to hold them to account, and consumers have had no trouble suing airlines successfully when necessary.

In the case of "weights and balances", if they falsely remove you for that reason and put some other crew member they need to move on instead, that seems like it would be pretty easy to show is bullshit.

[kortilla]

>You seem very defeatist in all of your comments on this thread.

Because you are posting ridiculous comments implying that people have a bunch of rights to do things on a airplane that will end up landing them in jail or with big fines.

Step back and remember that you’re still on private property and the government has taken obscene steps in the industry to protect safety at all costs. There are very narrow rights you have with regard to monetary renumeration which you should leverage whenever you get the chance.

However, refusing to leave a plane when being asked to by the staff is always a losing move. There are no clear punishments for the airline and there are significant outs (“passenger was being unruly”).

> remove you for that reason and put some other crew member they need to move on instead, that seems like it would be pretty easy to show is bullshit.

Not if they bring the crew on, get them seated in jump seats, and then state that some people need to be removed.

This can happen even without manifest changes. If a significant storm pushes into the arrival airport when getting ready to depart it may delay the flight and alter fuel requirements for alternate airports. I’ve been on flights where they had to ask people to deplane in exchange for vouchers just to fly with the seats empty to offset weather range requirements.

[DannyBee]

I have not once claimed that they should not leave once asked, and in fact repeatedly said the opposite. Not leaving will get you dragged out for sure.

The correct answer, as I’ve said repeatedly in this thread, is to hold them to account in court

The rest of your claims and game playing loopholes have not faired well for airlines (or airport security) in court. That is why they settle, often for significant money. Have you bothered to look at the cases? I have.

[addingnumbers]

> They can easily use safety under “weights and balances” as the reason.

How would it play out for them to invoke that law disingenuously?

They won't use it to fly with an empty seat, nobody wants that except maybe a couple adjacent passengers who might enjoy the elbow room. The airline certainly doesn't want an empty seat.

If they stated out loud to someone that weight in that seat puts the passengers' lives at risk, then seats another person there, I'd hope the backlash would be instant and severe.